Читать книгу Lost Voices of the Edwardians: 1901–1910 in Their Own Words - Max Arthur, Max Arthur - Страница 69

I was born in Cornwall, where my father was a miner. But within a year he got a job working for an urban district council. He said, ‘This bairn's brought us luck.’ He built us a house, at West Kyo, ten miles south of Newcastle-upon-Tyne. In those days when you moved house it was on a horse and cart, with men with caps on. Mother was carrying me, trying to keep up with all our possessions, trying to get there with the key to let him in. She put me on the doorsteps to open the door. She opened the door and I walked along the passage – they didn't know I could walk. My father said, ‘I told you that bairn was going to bring us luck.’

My mother's father had a stroke, and he lay there for five years. There weren't nurses, if you had a stroke you just lay there. He lost his speech, and he was paralysed. My grandmother couldn't manage, so my mother sent me to school at three, so she could walk from West Kyo to the Lizzie Pit every day to help her mother turn and bath and feed him. I think my father used a bit of influence with the headmaster, but at that age, I couldn't do a lot.